forgot what I was gonna say...

I have some great thoughts every once in a while and wow, a day later I forget about them. Am I getting old, what is up with me. Just thought I would get on and bang out a few thoughts. Tonight we had some free time so guess what my wife started.....CHRISTMAS DECORATING! WOW, it is here I can not believe it. We always decorate right before Thanksgiving so when we come home from family stuff all is up and we are geared for Christmas. Well, we stared early and it was cool to see Kozbi help out, I just hauled stuff up from the basement and then helped keep Kelyn from breaking stuff. She loves breaking things! We are stoked about Christmas, we are actually doing less of the gift thing and really trying to cut back and just enjoy being the friends and celebrating the gift God gave us in Christ. This is the one time a year we get to celebrate this amazing gift given to us in the form of a baby! Everyone loves baby but there is something wild when you think about the fact that Jesus, God in form of man, was contained in the form of a baby. We are hoping that by cutting back we can give a little more and help our kids not get stuck in making Christmas about getting more stuff. SURE they are gonna get some neat stuff but that is not the focus. Just trying to do more than just talk about putting Christmas in the proper perspective, I have to start somewhere.

This weekend we are gonna have a sweet sports weekend. Thursday night we have tickets for the Nashville Predators (free tickets of course) we are gonna be in the lower bowl and I am stoked. Live NHL is so good...THEN we are taking Kozbi to her first UT game - YEP, we bought the tickets and are headed to Knoxville for the Vandy game. Go Vols!

I have decided not to shave my beard for the month of November...I have made it so far. We will see if I make it. 30 days of letting my beard grow??? well it is just a little challenge for myself! (I am trimming up my neck of course, I can not go around looking all shabby!

halloween then crave - a wild 2 weeks!

Wow, I am thrilled to see Monday...well compared to last Monday I am Stoked this Monday is here. Just made it through our first retreat at relevant that we called CRAVE. It was just a weekend to get teens away and ask how and if they are craving God in their lives. We held the retreat at the Galt House Hotel and Convention and had the Josh Wilson Band and Jeff Miller (great communicator!)lead us. It was an amazing weekend and a great experience for our teens. It was wild to have the event in a major city and have full control of the schedule, we had way too much fun. God really challenged us all to evaluate where we are at in our commitments, our relationships, our bravery, and our passion for HIM - every life group session was filled with kids talking through stuff with their leaders. It was so thrilling to see it come together. It was so different being able to just focus on this retreat for the ENTIRE FALL. This is such a new concept for me. The idea is to do more by doing less. Our ministry revolves around one weekly event for students called remix where we put tons of energy and about 4 major events a year, we took the entire fall to build to this retreat. It was amazing to focus and great for our kids to understand that our weekly gathering is the big deal, the event is just a great chance for us to get away and focus for a few days...the event never becomes the driving force in ministry, just another tool. Here's to leaving event driven youth ministry behind.

Halloween came and went and the kids had a great experience. Koz was Belle and Kelyn a flower and thy both had a blast trick or treating. The highlight for me was to answer the door to a bunch of middle schoolers dressed up, to give them candy, then to have a little kids act like he was chopping my arm off with his plastic chain saw - wow - I LOVE America! I will drop in a picture of the girls, OH they are so great!

Go Vols, Go Titans - Go michael bayne's fantasy teams! yes it matters!

friday night ramblings...

Chelsea is rocking Kelyn to sleep and I have said my good nights to the girls (I added a pic that we took a few days ago ) so I thought I would get on here and get some thoughts out from the week. Last week we went through the loos of a great friend Imilse Watts. Imilse is the mom of one of my leaders in our student ministry. This week I have been thinking a lot about her and about how her family is adjusting to her being in heaven. Is that not wild to think, she is in heaven, wow - that is our hope as a follower of Christ. One thought from last week was that we experienced the funeral First Baptist Clarksville. It was just as she would have wanted it because it brought three churches (FBC, Grace, and Exit One) together in one room and celebrate Jesus and celebrate Imilse. WOW, for one hour we all sat down together as one and it was so great to connect with so mant people. Many time I wonder what divides us as churches and as denominations, we allow it to happen for what ever reason. It was great to lay all of the differences aside and be together as one. I have so many friends at First and I am grateful for being able to serve there for over 3 1/2 years. I am also thrilled to be doing ministry at GCC but it is so sweet to look around and be reminded that followers of Christ are one. We should support and pray for each other...we should seek to stop divisive talk and thinking...we should find ways to encourage one another. Pride leads us to think much of ourselves but Christ asks us to be less so He can be more in our lives and churches. Imilse helped us to be able to get there last week, thanks again Imilse...

This coming weekend we have our first retreat at relevant student ministry. Crave is one weekend for kids to get ways and just work on CRAVING God more than the things of this world. it is gonna be so incredible but I am so thankful fora team at GCC that has enabled us and encouraged us to do this right. For a first retreat this is gonna be amazing. I am thrilled to see what God is gonna do and maybe after next weekend I wll be able to share some about it. My hearts desire is that teens will connect with God in a pwerful way. They are gonna have a great time but I hope the Holy Spirit does work in their hearts that is long lasting and intense.

This weekend, hoping for a UT ad Titan win! As bad as the vols are I can only say GO VOLS! You lose and win with your team. The Titans, well it has been a fun year. We will see how we do against Oakland. Hoping for 5-2!!!!

starbucks or walmart?

Before I write this "church thought" out I wanted to celebrate the fact that a dear saint and good friend, Imilse Watts, is now loving life in Heaven today. I am both sad and happy for her at the same time. She will be so missed here by her friends and family. Imilse was one of the most encouraging people I ever met, she was a prayer warrior, she loved people and loved Jesus. Her husband and two daughters Cassandra and Katrina are so amazing and she loved them dearly. Imilse had battled with asthma for years and hated when it kept her from ministering to people. She hated being sick and not feeling well. I con only imagine right now that she is breathing deep and catching up with Cookie Prine! Oh man, Cookie and Imilse together, for those of you how know that combo you can only imagine. Imilse, we love ya and will miss ya.

I had a thought about church life the other day and I wanted to go ahead and write it out. it is not new but I finally grabbed on to it. In my church life I have moved from leading in a church culture that tried to have a "wal-mart" philosophy of ministry (LOTS OF OPTIONS!) to a starbucks way of church (A FEW GREAT OPTIONS). Walmart has everything, tries to sell everything, tries to compete with everyone. Starbucks tries to sell coffee and create an atmosphere for their customers and employees that makes you want to be there. I do not even drink coffee and I love the place. It dawned on my that in my current ministry role I am striving to create an environment that looks a lot more like Starbucks rather than Walmart. At relevant student ministry or Cross Street, or grace Acres, or the gathering at GCC, or community groups at GCC...we just do a few things well. We are trying to focus on just a few things and get those right. Again, new things dawn on me all the time right now, this new way of ministry, new way of church has been amazing but now I am trying to figure out why I am serving, loving, living different in community. It is great to be able to focus...not just talk about it.

I wonder if people are looking for churches that strive for excellence in what they do best, unique, creative places to gather in community. This could be why we need churches to re imagine what they can be as a community of believers. Different churches are going to reach different people looking for different things. No one church has all the answers, all the perfect environments. The one thing that is for sure is that it is a new day in church life for new and established churches. Hopefully we can seize the shift and see God brought greater fame! Our God reigns!

winning is great!

the vols won, the titans won...

good times!

MB

from CATALYST posted late...

Catalyst Blog October 5, 2007

Spent the last two days at Catalyst…a leadership event for young leaders, well church leaders, well business leaders, well just leaders. It is just a place for leaders who love Jesus Christ to gather and think through how we can lead the church, our business, and our families. If you follow Christ you realize that none of us have it together, none of us are qualified because when we place our lives alongside Jesus we never can match up. Jesus still comes along us and says come on….let’s do this together. The great thing is we only have to see HIS PLAN, and Jesus always has a plan. The plan of Jesus looks so different from any other plan we can find but yet it always leads us to love God and love People, it is simple but complex and calls us to yield everything to this idea because it is all consuming. WELL – enough – it is great to be around leaders who love Christ and are trying to live for Christ and get on His plan.

I am in the conference right now and God has brought up so many things ONCE AGIN. God never seems to leave me alone when I get to hear folks talk about leadership. Right now John Maxwell is talking about adding value to people every day. WOW, Am I doing that? WOW, that is all I can say. Several moments have been huge but Francis Chan asking us if we were still understood the fact that God has made no mistake with where he has placed us as leaders. God knew, Jeremiah 1 makes it clear that God has made no mistake where he has placed us and we do not lead because of any other reason than God has given us the chance. God has called me to say or do the hard thing because he has placed me and He has the plan. There was something God was doing in the room because we all tend to assume we are so important and we have developed our influence, we have made it and all the time GOD is leading the way.

Rick Warren sat in a chair on stage and called us to a second reformation, a reformation of not creed but deed. A chance for our generation, for our churches to change the world. We can change the way people see the church, we can change the image of what people assume of Jesus. Saddleback has launched the PEACE plan…our churched can embrace the call of Jesus and live lives that will look like Jesus. I find myself being drawn to that place. I am not sure what it will look like but I am in.

For me I am more worried about what Jesus is thinking about my life and ministry and family rather than what PEOPLE (the people I am supposed to impress) think. God has placed me in a unique place of doing ministry with people I love and I will lay my life down with in the name of Christ. Our family at Grace is amazing and we are getting to rethink church and living out our faith. My wife has supported me every step of the way in my journey with Christ and we are on the same page – we are dreaming dreams together and loving Christ together. I am also a dad – well I am just trying to serve my girls. I feel like I have the chance to live with no chains of religion or people pleasing (yes I struggle there) Well we will see what happens, this is just where I am right now. Let’s live in the freedom of Christ…freedom to love, freedom to serve, freedom to LIVE in the moment.

operation serve...

Saturday I got to know Dorthy and Roy as myself and a team of folks worked a their house all day doing soe simle repairs to their house. We were a part of operation serve, one day for people at GCC to go into the community to serve others. We had over 600 people serving all over Montgomery county, not just talking about the love of God but showing others the Love of God. Simple but profound. I was able to talk to Roy and Dorthy about their faith, they are believers, the know Christ but they live in a hard part of town, they have had a hard few years, they needed a God moment in their life and we were able to bring it to them. There is something amazing about serving others, there is something about going to a hard neighborhood and helping a hurting community. It just seems like something Jesus would do and for one day our entire church was focused on that goal. I am grateful that Dorthy and Roy allowed us to help them and get to know them. I am thankful that God allows the church to be his hands and feet in a borken world. Wat could happen if we all began to choose to carry out Jesus like actions.

To all our teenagers that served in Operation Serve, I am so proud of you. Yes, teens and parents serving together. That is youth ministry!

first baptism...

Tonight was an incredible night at REMIX, we got to baptize my friend LT Roper. I met LT the second week I was here at GCC, his friend Ethan had invited him to church and guess what, He met Jesus Christ and became a Christ follower. It was so amazing, he immediately plugged in and we got to celebrate baptism with him tonight our student gathering, REMIX. Yes we had a great night, getting to meet LT's family and celebrate with them was amazing. We also got to see week 2 of our life[groups] and that went so well - the group leaders and students are really connecting...we think it is a win when kids actually get to talk about and reflect on what we talked about in our gathering. Good times!

well - Titans lost, the Vols lost, I am still here typing. I am gonna be OK. we need new Coached at the Univeristy of Tennessee but my Titans are playing hard.

OK - the losses are hurting! I am done typing!

dream together...

well, it is a week after my vacation and I am still alive and back in the swing of things. Last week was a great week but when you come off of vacation you have to just hit tht ground running and vatch up with what has passed while you were gone. Well - we caught up and all was good. This weekend the VOLS won, the TITANS win, my fantasy football teams won! It was a good weekend and it was wonderful to have an entire weekend of football. Last night Kozbi sat on the couch and watched Baltimore and Cini...wow, that is a mother dad moment! We saw a great tackle by Ed Reed!

I have been struck with the idea of dreaming together. Larry Milton at St. B Christian and I have been working to get the GCC student ministry off and running while using their building. We have partnered with another church to accomplish a goal together. They have the space, we have the staff and we are working together. IT IS WORKING, I do not know of any other ministries around the country partnering with another local church to do student ministry. Since when does every church have to do their own thing at their own place on their own terms, What could happen if more churches started working together for the KINGDOM OF GOD, to see God made famous here here in Clarksville...Maybe we can keep working together and keep dreaming together. We will see what God does.

last day from Surf City...

The week has come to an end, and it has been such a blessing. The chance to slown down and rest is so valuable to me. It is not just good it is so needed. I look back at the week and think back to all the memories I got to share with the folks here on vacation...all of them being family...it is just wild to think about the time we got to spend together. Got to read a ton of BUILT TO LAST by Jim Collins and Jerry Porras, wow I am swimming in the reality of the many pearls of wisdom in this book. What is amazing is that the book lines out the difference between a visionary company or organization and one who just exists day to day with no forward vision. I feel that there are so many aspects of GCC that are visionary, I think we are living out a visionary dream and it is wild. If you have not read this book go get it and enjoy. College football starts tonight for the Vol nation, can not wait till 7 PM central! Had a fantasy football draft this morning, yes that was fun. Feel like my head is kind of clear, more focused and excited about getting back to Clarksville Monday afternoon, back to the YMCA for a run, back to GCC and the crazy people i work with, back home. Here are a few final pics of the girls...one is of Kelyn and the other is a group silly pic of all the kids in the family...